"Try building an application in PHP which takes a data set, processes it for and hour and then stores the results for the user when they return. You could hack together a php / c application that'd probably involved a couple of shell scripts, a cron entry, and some major security holes. JAVA makes this relatively easy, secure and self contained."
Uh, no. Don't talk if you have no clue what you're talking about. I could do this in 5 minutes minus the C application, shell scripts, cron entry, and major security holes. If you want me to prove it I will. In the meanwhile I suggest you introduce yourself to PHP's set_time_limit(), exec(), and while.